Sipping My Way to Sanity
Cheers to all you mamas out there who just might be, “Sipping Your Way to Sanity.” Here’s to those who’ve had a killer day at work and came back to a tantrum. To those who’ve tried to leave their house an hour earlier but were busy wrangling the herd. To those who have wanted to basically stick their fingers in their ears, scream “LALALALALAAAAA” and pretend, for a mere moment in time, a blip in reality, that they never had children. This post, my fellow mamas, is for you…
Sipping My Way to Sanity
THERE IS LITTLE MEDINCINE that cures the insane to sane, the child shrieking shouts to child chill-outs, the husband headaches to husband halos. Little in the way of help for such abhorrent ailments. You can’t yell, can’t pray, can’t plead your way to the sanity Gods and Goddesses. When nothing else seems to work, and you feel defeated yet again, this simple solution might find you well: I’ve come to realize that you can most certainly, and should surely, start sipping your way to sanity. This is a skill in which I’ve become quite adept.
Sip, slurp, “Sure!”
Sip, slurp, “What?! No problem!”
Sip, slurp, “Spilt milk? Who cares!”
If I had a prescription pad it would read:
“One glass of wine per hour. Not to exceed one bottle per day.”
And, that would be my doctor’s handwriting. Barely legible, but kinda cute. (Side note: WordPress won’t allow me to keep my original and adorable font). An unnecessary point that I thought I’d share.
The problem with this is that we shouldn’t be drinking a bottle of wine per day. I wish that were an acceptable thing to do and that I wouldn’t be a shit teacher, colleague, and mom if I opted to imbibe daily in such a fashion. In fact, I wish that style was in fashion! I’d rock the shit out of it! Quick! Someone get Gucci into the wine making industry! I think this would make the winos of the world look more acceptable. Though, I think my face would get fat, my liver further damaged (four years of college plus about ten more because my mind never left that ‘university of booze’), and I’d most likely stop going to the gym (God bless Zumba classes and treadmills with TVs), and in turn gain an additional thigh, which Lord knows I most certainly can’t afford to gain. I sometimes pretend there is a parallel universe where all of the “no, you shouldn’t-s” are “yes, you should-s” and vice versa. Yes, I could see myself in a perfectly pretty place like that.
I had a crazy day at work last week. My students were fucking mental, and getting ready for multiple concerts makes my anxiety soar through the roof. You’d never know it by looking at me but I truly detest the weeks leading up to performances. The day itself? Totally cool as shit. Ugh. I came home and G-man was sick and in quite a mood, it was raining hard, again (note-to-self, this is what makes Oregon so beautiful so I should forgive Mother Nature…again), and I totally forgot to go to the store for food. What’s worse? I. Was out. Of wine! How could I have let this happen?! Someone upstairs must hate me today (rule of thumb for mothers: place blame elsewhere…always). So, instead of going to get food, I plopped my kiddo in the stroller, walked with the speed of light to the wine store next door (yes, next door- a blessing or curse in disguise… you decide) and voila! Bought myself a sultry and too expensive beautiful bottle of Pinot Noir. Oh, yes, I did. “Food? Pshhh… I’ll throw some things in a pan!” “Crying baby? Double ppshh! I’ll turn on the tube while I throw things in a pan.’ “Students and looming dark concert cloud following my sanity to hell? Triple pshhh! I’ll drink that shit away!” I confess, those are the days where I very well might have the entire bottle of wine. Plus, that shit spoils if you leave it overnight, right? (wink)
In reality, at the end of the day, all is forgiven. When my little man tells me, “Mommy, Ms. J (his nanny) doesn’t have eyeballs,” or “When I get older I’ll have a vagina then, okay?” or “Mommy, you need lemon for the hummus. You don’t know?” After he had gotten me all of the hummus ingredients without me reminding him, and I had actually forgotten the lemon. What a precious piece of pie. He’s my main squeeze, and it is he who is truly my best medicine.
Xanax & Xylophones/Husbands & Headaches
Xanax & Xylophones/Husbands & Headaches is a post from my up and coming book, “One More Sip of Whine.” It is a humorous tale of my experience in motherhood thus far. Crude, raw, honest, crass, foul mouthed in nature sums up this book. It will be released this summer on Amazon Kindle. Enjoy the chapter and keep a look out for the release! I will post on my blog when that date has arrived. Let me know your thoughts in the comments. Thanks!
Xanax & Xylophones/Husbands & Headaches
NOISE. HEADACHE. CHILD. HUSBAND. Noise. Headache. Child. Husband… and the cycle continues. It’s Groundhog’s day here at the Rugile/Burns household but I’m not getting paid Murray style moola for this gig. Through my long and winding road that I’ve travelled, where did I fail to turn towards the path of enlightenment? Maybe I should consider embracing Buddhism. I do love those bald and fat bellied statues, especially in my garden. Also, I think I could really get down with meditation, or at least the music, especially when coupled with a sweet massage. Lastly, I freakin’ love Thailand and any excuse to go back there is a good one.
I am sure I’ll mention this many times; I am a music teacher. Colleagues come into my classroom regularly and ask me how I cope with all of the incredible noise. To which I retort, “what noise? Oh, that? I’ve stopped hearing those sounds years ago.” I say this coupled with a ‘pish-posh-like’ flick of the hair and slight ‘tude. I don’t hear the children, their instruments, their exuberant yelps, dog like whines, cat clawing arguments etc. It’s not that I don’t give a crap, I have simply learned to block them out. I could never do this job if I heard every last itty bitty freakin’ bang, crash, or curse. I’d go “bleepin’” mental. However, when I am home, I hear everything. I hear lil’ G’s adorable laughter and Thomas’ (my husband) silly toddler voices and then… screech! The sound of a record going tits up and my ears and brain begin to bleed. Once the bleeding starts, it’s almost impossible to stop. In fact, I sometimes begin hemorrhaging. And then, once again, all of the mother shamers swim up, thirsty, ready to chew me to shreds. They can smell me from a million miles away. “There she goes again, ruining her child… again…” However, I should really say, “There she goes again, ruining her children… again…” Remember, I, too, am a wife, which means, I have a ‘huschild’. It goes a lil’ somethin’ like this: The banging of the metal xylophone (the loudest instrument on earth- thanks Gymboree), throw in the tambourine (Thomas’ go-to and most favorite musical toy- ‘bleep’ me), screaming, add some ‘singing’; “Danny Boy,” with some interesting lyrics and about 5 different key changes in one phrase, kill my musical ears now, Sky news (Thomas is Scottish) blaring from the television in the background, the sound of my somewhat broken drier banging harder than a whore and her pimp on a headboard, and then, right when my brain is about to spontaneously combust, someone decides now is a really great time to throw in the lovely timbre of the recorder, but not before shot-putting a couple of drum sticks in my general direction. I love my life, I love my life, I love my life, I think I can, I think I can, I think I can… Mommy needs a Xanax, ‘children’.
Now, every time, okay, almost every time I see/hear my munchkin doing/saying something that is fairly questionable I ask myself this, “What would Xanax Heather do?” and, voila! I have my answer!
Heather: “Sh**, should he be standing on the countertop that close to the edge?”
Xanax Heather: “‘Bleep’ it! He’s allllll gooood.!”
So, I go with the latter.
Heather: “Two pancakes. Greyson, mommy said only two pancakes!”
Xanax Heather: “‘Bleep’ it! Have three. No, ‘bleep’ that, have ten!” … “Let them eat cake! Let them alllll eat cake! Mwahahahahahahahaaaaaa!”
So, again, I go with the latter. Once adopting this new and glorious frame of mind, this adorable and insane new philosophy, I find myself breathing easier and needing “one less sip of whine.” Catch my drift? Good.
*A cleaned up version of a chapter in my upcoming book, “One More Sip of Whine,” which will be published on Amazon Kindle this summer. Tales of motherhood told through a raw, crude, foul mouthed, and humorous lens.
*Image from Dreamstime
https://www.dreamstime.com/stock-illustration-overwhelmed-mother-woman-messy-room-illustration-background-image53592840
-Written by,
Heather Rugile
